Recently in NASA Culture Category

Mary Roach's Packing for Mars: the Curious Science of Life in the Void will give you a whole new view of an astronaut's life

Frank Sietzen, Jr.: For most of us spacers human spaceflight is nothing to, well, joke about. After all, riding rockets into the cosmos is serious business, and there's nothing that NASA or we do better than take ourselves seriously - perhaps too seriously. In the last 30 years or so, only Tom Wolfe's "The Right Stuff" gave us permission to laugh out loud when contemplating some of the inconveniences of spaceflight. Until now, that is.

Mary Roach, one of America's most successful and prolific science writers, has made an art form out of picking a little known or understood area of science and doing some first-person research. In her "Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers", she tells us more than we'd ever wish to know about what happens to our bodies after we croak. In "Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife" she gives us a window on ghosts, spooks, and what many believe follows death. In "Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex" she throws herself into deconstructing the sexual impulse, visiting the top sex researchers in the world's universities and laboratories, while enlisting some front-line help from her long-suffering husband, no less.

In "Packing for Mars: The Curious Science of Life in the Void" Roach gives the same in-depth treatment to global preparations for long duration human spaceflight.

Citizen Scientists Discover Rotating Pulsar, NSF

"Idle computers are the astronomers' playground: Three citizen scientists--an American couple and a German--have discovered a new radio pulsar hidden in data gathered by the Arecibo Observatory. This is the first deep-space discovery by Einstein@Home, which uses donated time from the home and office computers of 250,000 volunteers from 192 different countries. This is the first genuine astronomical discovery by a public volunteer distributed computing project"

Keith's note: GSFC PAO has taken to bragging a bit. This little gem is posted at the bottom of some photo captions on their Flickr account: "NASA Goddard Space Flight Center is home to the nation's largest organization of combined scientists, engineers and technologists that build spacecraft, instruments and new technology to study the Earth, the sun, our solar system, and the universe."

Is this accurate? I'm not exactly certain that it is. The words they use are not exactly defined i.e. "organization". Perhaps GSFC PAO could provide the statistics upon which they make this claim.

NASA Idea Brainstorming Tool, Open Government at NASA

"NASA is seeking input on the creation of the NASA Open Government Plan. As outlined in the Open Government Directive, this brainstorming tool is a mechanism gain input on how to make the key principle of openness a meaningful pillar of NASA's mission, and how to implement participation, transparency and collaboration activities such that NASA becomes more relevant, efficient, and accountable. Key ideas and suggestions developed through this process will be prioritized in the NASA Open Government Plan."

Keith's note: You can watch the NASA Advisory Council's Subcommittee on Education and Public Outreach meeting today live via USTREAMTV here between 10 am and 4 pm EST.

After all the abuse I heap on the agency, I am glad to see that NASA is finally getting the message. Eventually, all NAC meetings - including all NAC subcommittee meetings - need to be made available to the public like this - live and interactive. Right now these meetings are only witnessed by one or two dozen people. The presentations often take a long time to get online - if ever. Transcripts or recordings are never posted. All that emerges are meeting summaries than can take months to produce - and when they do, are bland and devoid of any meaningful content. Hardly what anyone would call "transparent". Murky at best.

reader note: "An unbadged man said to me as I left my JSC building last Friday, "Is this a place of business or a campus? I mean, is this 'where it all happens'?" I was going to challenge him but he explained he was a bus driver from that bus over there that had brought in some people. I said, just, Yes Sir! and went on home. (It was a tough week.)

Today, I don't know how that question would be answered in that building. I'm angry the question has even come up. I wasn't born here at JSC, but I got here as soon as I could. I just don't know whether here is supposed to be 'where it all happens' anymore."

Keith's note: You know that the message plan NASA has been trying to roll out is not working when signs carried by protesters outside of KSC today say "Obama lied - NASA died". It gets worse: I also received a link to a YouTube video from someone sitting at their desk at NASA that uses captioned movie footage of an actor playing Hitler to criticise the Obama decision on Constellation. This ain't good folks.

Keith's update: Oh yes - to all of you who are demanding that I post a link to the Hitler video: No way. I find even a casual comparison of anyone to Hitler under any circumstances to be reprehensible and I will not allow this website to be a party to that. If you do not like this policy, then go find another website to read. There will be no further discussion on this topic. Alas, Portal to the Universe, "the latest Cornerstone project of the International Year of Astronomy 2009 (IYA2009)" apparently thinks that Hitler jokes are funny. The posting is by "AmericaSpace" which is run by Jim Hillhouse. Using Hitler - in any context - is never funny and only serves to drag any associated discussion into the gutter.

"NASA Administrator Charles Bolden outlines the Administration's fiscal year 2011 budget request as the agency's road map for a new era of innovation and discovery, and answers questions from reporters as the featured Newsmaker at the National Press Club in Washington Feb. 2"

Keith's note: If you go to 55:18 in this video, I ask Charlie Bolden how he is going to get people to make the transition from flying government-operated spacecraft to commerically- operated spacecraft - and the emotion that goes with making the transition from one way of thinking to another. Bolden's reply gets deep into the emotions and mindsets that underly the changes that the Constellation workforce is now going through - and how he is going to work through that process with them.

Transcript below

Keith's note: Now that NASA has been directed by the White House to cancel Constellation, and with it, all of NASA's big time lunar ambitions, I wonder when they will start to yank things like this sad dancing Moon walker animation offline. Seriously - this is not an insignificant task since there is an immense amount of VSE-related material that NASA has put online since 2004 that will now need to be modified or deleted. In addition, many third party websites contain large amounts of this material as well. And when do you start? Now? When Congress gives up trying to stop this cancellation?

Imagine that there was an Internet in 1967 and you had to erase the Apollo program.

Planet 51 PSA Campaign Brings NASA's Message of Exploration Down to Earth

"In a public service announcement about diversity, Johnson underscores the importance of a global work force: "On this planet promoting diversity is very important. At NASA, astronauts from all nationalities and backgrounds work together aboard the International Space Station to help improve our lives here on Earth. I'm here to tell you that every barrier is meant to be broken, whether it's the sound barrier, the furthest layer of the Earth's atmosphere, the outer limits of our solar system, or the challenges we face here at home."

Keith's note: There was a lot of talk (with no mention whatsoever of NASA or space exploration) at TEDxNASA held by NASA LaRC in Newport News, VA on Friday about dealing with poverty, racism, inclusivenes, inspiration, etc. On the same day that this event was being held, NASA HQ PAO released a PSA featuring Dwayne "Rock" Johnson, who stars in the new film "Planet 51". A DVD of this film was flown and photographed in space.